Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by nuclear fission. Probably the most famous equation in the world is E =mc2. You may have heard of it. You may have even seen it on a tee shirt or coffee mug. It's a simple equation that was derived in 1905 by the physicist Albert Einstein. It changed how scientists view two of the most basic concepts in science: matter and energy. The equation shows... Show more Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by nuclear fission. Probably the most famous equation in the world is E =mc2. You may have heard of it. You may have even seen it on a tee shirt or coffee mug. It's a simple equation that was derived in 1905 by the physicist Albert Einstein. It changed how scientists view two of the most basic concepts in science: matter and energy. The equation shows that matter and energy are two forms of the same thing. It also shows how matter and energy are related and why nuclear reactions produce so much energy. In Einstein's equation, the variable E stands for energy and the variable m stands for mass. The letter c in the equation is a constant. It stands for the speed of light. The speed of light is 300,000 kilometers (186,000 miles) per second, so c2 is a very big number, no matter what units are used to measure it. Einstein's equation means that the energy in a given amount of matter is equal to its mass times the square of the speed of light. That's a huge amount of energy from even a tiny amount of mass. Suppose, for example, that you have 1 gram of matter. That's about the mass of a paperclip. Multiplying that mass by the square of the speed of light yields enough energy to power 3,600 homes for a year! When the nucleus of a radioisotope undergoes fission or fusion, it loses a tiny amount of mass. What happens to the lost mass? It isn't really lost at all. It is converted to energy. How much energy? E = mc2. The change in mass is tiny, but it results in a great deal of energy. Show less
Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by nuclear fission. Probably the most famous equation in the world is E =mc2. You may have heard of it. You may have even seen it on a tee shirt or coffee mug. It's a simple equation that was derived in 1905 by the physicist Albert Einstein. It changed how scientists view two of the most basic concepts in science: matter and energy. The equation shows that matter and energy are two forms of the same thing. It also shows how matter and energy are related and why nuclear reactions produce so much energy. In Einstein's equation, the variable E stands for energy and the variable m stands for mass. The letter c in the equation is a constant. It stands for the speed of light. The speed of light is 300,000 kilometers (186,000 miles) per second, so c2 is a very big number, no matter what units are used to measure it. Einstein's equation means that the energy in a given amount of matter is equal to its mass times the square of the speed of light. That's a huge amount of energy from even a tiny amount of mass.
Suppose, for example, that you have 1 gram of matter. That's about the mass of a paperclip. Multiplying that mass by the square of the speed of light yields enough energy to power 3,600 homes for a year! When the nucleus of a radioisotope undergoes fission or fusion, it loses a tiny amount of mass. What happens to the lost mass? It isn't really lost at all. It is converted to energy. How much energy? E = mc2. The change in mass is tiny, but it results in a great deal of energy.
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